What is cardiac coronary artery bypass surgery

  As we all know, coronary arteries are blood vessels that transport blood and oxygen to nourish the heart, and what we often call coronary heart disease is the occurrence of atherosclerosis in the coronary arteries, whose lesions are characterized by the formation of large amounts of fatty deposits on the walls of arterial vessels, which are called atherosclerotic plaques. These fatty deposits make the inner layer of blood vessels thicken and coarse, and over time, the lumen of blood vessels narrow, reducing or preventing blood supply to the myocardium, and nearly resulting in myocardial ischemia, which increases the risk of angina pectoris, myocardial infarction and even sudden death.  Coronary artery bypass surgery is a very important and definitive treatment to increase blood supply to the myocardium, reduce symptoms and help restore the heart’s function.  The surgeon directly confronts the heart and diseased arteries through an incision in the midline of the patient’s chest, helping the patient to re-establish the blood and oxygen supply to the heart muscle. Usually the surgeon harvests the patient’s own healthy arteries and veins to create a coronary artery bypass, a channel that allows the needed blood to bypass the narrowed branch of the coronary artery so that the blood can pass through this new vessel across the narrowed or blocked portion of the original coronary artery to supply blood to the heart muscle and rejuvenate the ischemic heart muscle.  Coronary artery bypass surgery became a standard procedure in the late 1950s and is now performed in more than 600,000 cases worldwide each year, with a very high safety profile.  In traditional bypass surgery, the surgeon uses drugs to stop the heart with the aid of an artificial heart-lung machine, allowing the procedure to be performed in a static, bloodless condition. The artificial heart-lung machine is like a “pump” that temporarily replaces the heart and lungs, constantly delivering oxygen and nutrients to all parts of the body to maintain the body’s needs, but the artificial heart-lung machine also poses many risks such as increased bleeding and damage to vital organs such as the kidneys, lungs and brain.  In recent years, with the rapid development of surgical techniques and medical instruments, surgeons can perform coronary artery bypass surgery without the use of artificial heart-lung machines in the majority of patients with a beating heart, which allows patients to recover faster because this technique avoids the possible damage caused by artificial heart-lung machines. At present, the cardiac surgery department in Tianjin Chest Hospital has mastered this technology, and most of the patients are discharged from the hospital 7 days after the operation, and resume normal work 2 to 3 months after discharge, the success rate of the operation has reached the advanced level in the world developed countries, providing a very good surgical treatment guarantee for the coronary heart patients in our city.  The purpose of coronary artery bypass surgery is to rejuvenate the ischemic myocardium to reduce the sudden death rate, reduce or even eliminate angina attacks and thus improve the quality of life, but the final result of each patient is entirely based on the degree of coronary artery disease and myocardial damage before surgery, because myocardial ischemia is like a flower lack of water, lack of water for a long time, many branches and leaves dried up and died even if watered again can not be revived. Therefore, once a coronary heart patient is not well treated with medication, he should be hospitalized for further examination in order to save more ischemic myocardium through active treatment and achieve the best therapeutic effect, and the earlier he receives treatment, the less risky the treatment will be.  In conclusion, we earnestly hope that all people understand the common sense of prevention and treatment of coronary heart disease, overcome the fear with scientific attitude, pay attention to the maintenance of our heart, so that our heart is always energetic.